Agogo youth demand withdrawal of security task force

The Agogo Youth Association has strongly criticized the security task force deployed to the area to rein in the atrocities of nomadic Fulani herdsmen and demanded its immediate withdrawal.

The association insists that the deployment of the security officers has not in any way stopped the alien herdsmen and their cattle from terrorizing farmers and wreaking havoc on food crop farms and water bodies.

Mr. Emmanuel Buabeng, its Chairman, told a press conference at Agogo that if anything, their presence had rather emboldened the Fulani to continue to make life miserable for the people.

Addressing a press conference at Agogo, he said the taskforce instead of moving to areas, where the destructive activities of the Fulani had been pronounced had confined its operations to the district capital.

The officers had been put in an expensive Guest House and rarely make it to the villages where “women are raped, people killed and farms burned”.

Mr. Buabeng stated that the taskforce had simply become a drain on the limited resources of the Asante-Akim North District Assembly and that, it was not serving the interest of the people.

The youth leader also accused the District Commander, Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP) Asamoah Agyekum, of protecting alien herdsmen, known to have committed crimes and asked that he was transferred from the area.

He alleged that the police were quick to prosecute indigenes on mere suspicion of having committed a crime but reluctant to arrest herdsmen found to be involved in heinous crimes.

Mr. Buabeng said the people were being pushed to a point where they would have no other option but to engage the herdsmen in a confrontation – a dreadful scenario, the taskforce had been sent to avert.